Fountains In Kansas City

There's just something about a fountain that says "here is a nice place." A column of water cheerfully spewing from the mouth of a whale into a simple concrete pool can greatly effect the desirability of a neighborhood and spruce up even the drabbest of the Corktown lofts Toronto has so many of. Kansas City is extremely proud of its fountain prowess. It has over 200 fountains, a number which is second only to the city of Rome in Italy. The fountains give the city its identity and character and draw in visitors from all over the world. For people like you who would like to know more, we've created this overview of Kansas City fountains.

The Origin of the Fountains

The impetus for building most of the fountains you see in Kansas City today wasn't just that some architect while finishing their degree was wandering through UWO off campus housing and musing about how much nicer it would look with a couple of water pools. It was inspired by a movement that gripped cities all over the country in the 1890s and 1900s known as the City Beautiful Movement. The movement favored the construction of monolithic and iconic monuments to beautify cities in the hope of inspiring civic-mindedness in the people living there.

The First Fountains

Though the City Beautiful movement was all about making things aesthetically pleasing, Kansas City injected it with a little practicality. The earliest fountains were often monuments to a cause, such as cruelty to animals, and were designed to provide clean drinking water to people and horses. In this way, they not only beautified Wanless Park real estate but also served some purpose within the community. The most well-known of these early fountains was the one erected by the Humane Society in 1904 featuring water coming from lion's mouths and drinking pools for horses and dogs. It is now in the Wyandotte County Museum.

Fountain Designers

The list of famous names in architecture who had a hand in the building of Kansas City's fountains is longer and more distinguished even than the list of Canadian celebrities who own Toronto Beaches homes. George Kessler, who had worked under Frederick Law Olmstead, was the first architect brought on to the project. The first fountain he designed was destroyed in 1941, but the second, known as the Women's Leadership Fountain can still be seen at the corner of 9th and Paseo. Developer J.C. Nichols also used a large number of fountains to beautify his new development, Country Club Plaza, in the 1920s. Kansas City fountains also incorporate sculptures by Henri-Leon Greber and Carl Milles.

Famous Fountains

If you're ever able to coax your spouse out of your home in Uxbridge, Ontario to make a trip to Kansas City, here are some fountains you don't want to miss: the J.C. Nichols Memorial Fountain, the Children's Fountain, the William Volker Memorial Fountain, the Crown Center Square Fountain, the Eagle Scout Memorial Fountain, and the Waterworks Spectacular at the Kauffman baseball stadium.